Now, my knowledge of photography was terribly limited.
BEN SHAHNThe artist is likely to be looked upon with some uneasiness by the more conservative members of society.
More Ben Shahn Quotes
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The apprehension of… values is intuitive; but it is not a built-in intuition, not something with which one is born. Intuition in art is actually the result of… prolonged tuition.
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It is the mission of art to remind man from time to time that he is human, and the time is ripe, just now, today, for such a reminder.
BEN SHAHN -
An amateur artist is one who works all week at something else so he can paint on Saturday and Sunday. A professional artist is one whose wife works so he can paint all the time.
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If one has set for himself the position that his painting shall not misconstrue his personal mode of thinking, then he must be rather alert to just what he does think.
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The time when I had desire to go to the United States I didn’t have a penny. It was in the middle of the depression, you know. I couldn’t get as far as Hoboken at that time.
BEN SHAHN -
I believe that if it were left to artists to choose their own labels, most would choose none.
BEN SHAHN -
It is an intimately communicative affair between the painter and his painting, a conversation back and forth, the painting telling the painter even as it receives its shape and form.
BEN SHAHN -
Forms in art arise from the impact of idea upon material… so that thinking and belief and attitudes may endure as actual things.
BEN SHAHN -
An ametuer is an artist who supports himself with outside jobs which enable him to paint. A professional is someone whose wife works to enable him to paint.
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How do you paint yellow wheat against a yellow sky? You paint it jet black.
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Personal style, be it that of Michelangelo, or that of Tintoretto… has always been that peculiar personal rapport which has developed between an artist and his medium.
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Paint what you are, paint what you believe, paint what you feel.
BEN SHAHN -
The moving toward one’s inner self is a long pilgrimage for a painter. It offers many temporary successes and high points, but impels him on toward the more adequate image.
BEN SHAHN -
When you talk about war on poverty it doesn’t mean very much; but if you can show to some degree this sort of thing then you can show a great deal more of how people are living and a very great percentage of our people today.
BEN SHAHN -
Each artist comes to the painting or sculpture because there he can be told that he, the individual, transcends all classes and flouts all predictions. In the work of art, he finds his uniqueness confirmed.
BEN SHAHN